Gate Gourmet workers outside the local TGWU office in Hillingdon demanding their union leaders take up the fight to win their reinstatement

PASSING cars hooted in support as locked out Gate Gourmet workers picketed on the hill near Heathrow Airport yesterday.

Avtar told News Line: ‘We will not stop fighting and we are fighting to win.

‘I want my job back and it doesn’t matter how long it takes. The company picked me for compulsory redundancy because I had been sick.

‘Gate Gourmet management and my own union leaders agreed that I should be made redundant because I had been sick.

‘Can they bring a letter to court to say that they have never been sick. If workers have to work when they are sick then they will be slaves.

‘I’m not accepting compulsory redundancy, all workers should come to our conference at the end of January, we want their advice and we want their support.

‘We never believed that this could happen to us, we have been attacked by our employer and betrayed by our union leaders.’

Mrs Patel said: ‘If we had wanted redundancy we would have applied for it.

‘They picked me because I had been sick. They want slave labour.

‘The company sacked us because they want to bring in cheap labour and then the union leaders signed the agreement with them to make us compulsorily redundant based on what they called “objective criteria”.

‘They picked us for compulsory redundancy because we had been sick in the past and the union leaders agreed to it.

‘When I was sick I had a swollen face and hands, how can you work in a food factory when you are sick? The union leaders who signed it should resign.

‘We are looking forward to our conference at the end of January where we are coming together to discuss the situation.’

Raj said: ‘We campaigned hard for our march in Southall at the beginning of December and we are going to campaign for our conference at the end of January.

‘Over a thousand people came on our march and it was a great success. Our conference is very important.

‘The TGWU leaders are trying to say that the struggle at Gate Gourmet is over, it’s not over, we are fighting for our jobs back and won’t accept the betrayal.’